John Njuguna, a retired civil servant from Kanunga, Kiambu County is one of the success stories of fish farming.
Njuguna is the director of Kanunga Aqua Farm which sits on his one acre farm. “Just a few months after I kicked off keeping fish, some young aspiring fish farmers visited my farm because they heard that I was ‘doing well’. That challenged me to up my game,” says Njuguna. As expected, starting off was marked with one challenge after another.
“I had to visit other fish farmers to learn best practices,” the farmer says. He first started by keeping tilapia but changed to cat fish as they are easy to feed and mature faster. Njuguna harvests his produce twice a year and sells the fish to butcheries in Nairobi after his market in Congo collapsed since he could not satisfy the huge market.
“I used to have a market in Congo, but the deal was stopped because I could not meet the demand. I could not supply the tonnes of fish they wanted,” he reveals. The farmer says he harvests 200 fish a month that weigh between 2-3 kilos and sells one at Sh330. “I make around Sh70,000 profit from fish,” he reveals, smiling.
To boost their position in the market, he and a team of fish farmers formed Kiambu County Fish Farmers Association, where he is the chairman. Fish farming has opened numerous doors for Njuguna. He has visited Tanzania, Uganda, Burundi and Malawi. He plans to go to Israel with eight other fish farmers to learn skills on seed formulation and fish processing.
Before the end of the year, he hopes to also visit Mauritius, Thailand, Japan and Unites States of America to arm himself with cutting-edge knowledge as he braces himself to venture into fish processing. “Fish processing will enable us widen our market since fish eaters will have a variety to choose from the finished product.
That is why I plan to visit a number of countries which are doing well in fish farming,” he says. Mr Njuguna also has a hatchery in his compound where he hatchets for his fish ponds and sell to other fish farmers. The farmer, however, admits that the going has its fair share of challenges.
“Getting quality fish feed is a big challenge. That is why I had to start making my own feed. I also do not have a big freezer to keep fish for long. That means when I harvest my fish, I have to make sure I sell all of them otherwise they will go bad. But I plan to invest in a modern freezer soon,” he says.
He also trains interested farmers on seed formulation, how to manufacture fish feeds, processing and skills to start fish farming, at a fee. “For the five years, I have been in this business, I there have made tremendous profit part of which a potion of it I invested back into my venture,” adds Njuguna.
He has employed 11 permanent staff in his farm and his son who is currently pursuing a degree in Engineering also helps occasionally. For aspiring fish farmers, Njuguna says starting requires a small space and the fish are only fed three times a day. “So why not take up today?” he adds.